


Sometimes Just One Second

by thelinksthatconnectus (orphan_account)



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman: The Animated Series
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghosts, Character Turned Into a Ghost, Dark, F/M, Gen, Murder, One-Sided Attraction, One-Sided Relationship, Unhealthy Relationships
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-12
Updated: 2015-10-11
Packaged: 2018-04-26 00:03:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,265
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4981924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/thelinksthatconnectus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alice Pleasance lost everything the night that her obsessed coworker kidnapped her - her job, her family and fiancee, and her life. Through her, Jervis Tetch learns that he has more than just his upcoming homicide trial and adjustment to life at Arkham to worry about.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was based on this fan art (warning for blood):
> 
> http://dorinahv2.tumblr.com/post/130290884583/drawlloween-2015-oktober-1-ghost-jervis

It was as if he had grown wings. 

One moment he was held down, the Jabberwocky digging its claws first through his coat and then into his skin, and the next moment Jervis was standing again. The beastly statue moved as though it were lighter than a feather.

He stood up, straightening his back and locking his eyes with the bat. How silly he had been, Jervis realized. If he had just planned a bit more then he could have crushed the vermin beneath his feet. This was Gotham after all, and the flying rodent was destined to show up any time.

He stepped forward, one fist held outward and the other reaching into his coat's pocket. A good citizen of Wonderland always had an extra trick left up their sleeve after all.

Batman certainly moved through the air as if he were really his namesake creature. Though each move was sharp and practiced, every kick and punch holding his weight behind it, there was something graceful in his movements.

It was time that he finally cut the bat's wings. Jervis grinned, holding the knife high. It was sharp and thin, its silvery metal gleaming beneath the moonlight. Long that it could probably cut through the bat's chest and exit through his back, and pull out cleanly.

“I never invited you to this tea party,” Jervis commented. He grinned. “But you're here all the same, so I suppose that you deserve a slice of cake. Allow me to cut it for you!”

A silent kick was all that he got in return. It was just enough time for Jervis to dodge. He clutched the knife tighter, his heart racing in his chest and echoing through his ears.

“Do be a good little bat and fly off now,” Jervis commented. The two stepped dangerously close to the table, almost enough to where he bumped into it.

The bat's frown merely thickened. “I've already notified the police, Tetch. Your game is up.”

“I would say that it has just begun.” He smiled wider, a grin that even the Cheshire Cat would have been proud of. “And of what concern should those rats be to me?”

“I've also sent word to a certain man,” the bat replied, throwing another punch that again never quite reached Jervis, “a Billy. I believe that you and your 'guest' might know of him.”

His face went pale, and his eyes quickly turned back to the table as if he had expected Alice to have vanished then and there. “You aren't taking her!”

He struck violently, each movement faster than the last. He panted, each movement taking energy Jervis did not have, yet he kept slicing forward none the less. The bat's mouth opened wide, perhaps his eyes as well – everything was a blur of color, black and blue and red (so much red).

It was with a sudden kick, one that sent him flying to the air and toppling to the ground with a crash and sending a whole row of cards down with him, that Batman managed to get the knife out of the hatter's hands. It flew through the air only a few feet before landing with a clang.

“You can't have her! She's mine! She's mine!” Turning back, Jervis rushed through the maze. “I won't let him take her from me either! She's mine! She's mine!” Every word scratched at his dry throat.

The ax glowed in the moonlight, shined to a perfection and looking sharp enough to cut through anything. The pole fit so easily in his hands and it was incredibly light, easy enough to swing with his hands. His grin returned and he turned back.

“I'm not going to let you take her,” Jervis said. “Not now, not ever.”

If it's a game he wants, Jervis thought, then it's a game that he will get. He held the ax higher.

“...and all the players, except the King, the Queen, and Alice, were in custody and under sentence of execution.” 

The bat moved through the night as if he were made of the darkness itself. Jervis moved quickly, just barely dodging another kick. The longer it went on the more and more his legs ached and arms shook.

There was only one chance, one perfect strike now that the bat had lost his footing, fallen to the ground. Jervis raised the ax and took one long cut.

It was only when Batman moved again, the ax reaching his chest rather than his neck, that the lights appeared. They were a flurry of red and blue, accompanied by a harsh cry that made his ears ring.

“No.” The ax toppled from his hands and onto the ground below. He turned and ran back across the maze, rushing over fallen cards and heading back towards the tea table. Even after all the running earlier, he still found enough strength to move on forward.

Just as he was about to turn the corner, he saw the knife on the ground. It was almost completely red, save for a few bits of clean that shone pure white.

Those dear cards, Jervis thought. Did they really try painting the roses with this?

It fell into his pocket easily. The moment it was back in place, he continued forward. Bats were resilient creatures.

His heart slowed when he saw her again, still sitting there as before, eyes locked straight ahead.

“So sorry for the rush my dear,” he said. He grabbed her hand and she dutifully stood. “I suppose that we will have to take tea another time.”

Now all they needed was a nice rabbit hole to fall and disappear into.

The maze of cards, this little slice of Wonderland hidden inside of Gotham, had been etched into his heart and mapped into his mind. The two rushed through the maze as easily as one walking down a beaten path. While the lights still blared and the sirens cried on, the two continued forward.

“I hardly expected the night to end this way, darling.” He shrugged as the two moved past a corner. “But I suppose the only thing to expect was to expect nothing at all.”

Perhaps he should have turned another corner.

Jervis froze, Alice following behind him.

No, no, no! Stuff and nonsense! This was worse than a Jabberwocky, far more terrifying than any of the red queen's temper tantrums or any of her executioner's sharp axes.

“Alice?” Billy's eyes widened. When he got no reply, his eyebrows lowered. “What the hell did you do to her?”

Jervis clutched her hand tighter.

The shadow appeared suddenly, blocking any light. Quickly, Jervis moved to the side, Alice following behind. He placed a hand out and moved in front of her, blocking her chest with his back.

The bat landed without making a sound. As torn as his cape was, as bruised as his chest, as sliced as his wings he still moved on.

“It's time to give up, Jervis.” His voice was throatier now, faster and sharper. “Whatever sick game you were trying to play, you've lost it.”

He reached for his pocket. If the two could just get a bit further ahead...

It was not the bat who struck next. The fist came fast, moving so fast that Jervis barely had time to register it before he heard a heavy crack.

“Let go of her, you freak!”

Jervis shoved his knife forward but it was only met with air. He bit his lip, the taste of blood sharp against his tongue.

His vision spun, the bat in one corner of his eyes and the boorish boy in the other. Blue and red lights swirled, mixing together into a deep purple shade that tinted everything he saw.

“No.” His face hardened. “No, no, no, no!”

Jervis turned back towards her. They were going to take her back, his precious Alice, force her back into her boring little life, suck out the only joy she had ever had. His only joy.

He met eyes with her. The jury had spoken before, had they not? He had spoken against Alice in court, watched the red queen and beastly jury decide her fate.

It was time to carry out her sentence.


	2. Chapter 2

Her eyes snapped open as if she had just woken up from a long dream. Rubbing her head, she blinked her eyes as her senses battled with all the light and noises around her.

“Jervis?” She had been with him, hadn't she? He had been at her apartment, been there to see her ring and hear the good news. And then... She rubbed harder at her head, as if the motion would spark her memory.

Slowly, her eyes pieced together the puzzle in front of her. Jervis was there, huddled over and still wearing his funny hat from earlier. How odd he looked, especially with that on. It made him look shorter than normal.

“Billy?” She turned her head. This certainly wasn't her apartment. Everything was green, red, and black.

The amusement park, she remembered. Yes, Jervis had taken her over the night previous and the two had strolled through the maze and then danced together.

But why were they back? Why was Billy here? And why... Oh, it was the question of the night.

Why, oh why, was Batman here?

“Jervis?” she called again. “Jervis, what's happening?” She turned back to Billy, who stood still, eyes on the ground. “Billy, what's wrong? What are we doing here?”

For a long moment, she merely stared at him. He did not even give her the slightest glance.

“Billy?” she repeated. Slowly, she turned her eyes downward.

-

Jervis had heard about Arkham Asylum before, whispers and horror stories, urban legends that he had taken with a grain of salt and a spot of tea. The stories were false of course, about as reliable as any story of a friend from a friend from said friend's cousin was. Arkham Asylum, as it turned out, was far worse than any of those other stories.

They had prepared his uniform so quickly that he barely had time to register the fact that he had been made to change. The clothes, a pale mix of blue and grey with his name stitched on one side above his breast, may have fit perfectly but they felt alien. This certainly was not clothing fit for a hatter.

His cell was set near the end of one ward, the wall on the left leading to a blank metal wall and the other to a long hallway, surrounded by matching doors, that seemed to go on into forever. It shut behind him with a heavy click.

The world had turned into a wash of grey ever since he had left Wonderland. Why, he had spent so much time there that he had long since forgotten what life outside of it was like.

Slowly, he walked to his cot. The doctors may have been coming soon, working all hours of the night, but right then he needed sleep. If he could just get a dream or two in...

Imagination, he reminded himself as he slowly lay down his head against the bumpy white rock of the asylum's excuse for a pillow, is the only weapon in the war against reality.

-

The sun rose after what felt like ages, illuminating the streets around her. All the night, ever since she had stumbled out of the park, floating past faceless police officers and endless rows of cards, she had wondered through the streets never quite seeming to reach anywhere. Gotham was certainly a large city, but it seemed as if she would never reach anywhere else.

Others soon joined her in the streets, dressed in sharp suits and holding briefcases. The world moved on, and none noticed the glowing girl in the poof-skirted dress. She floated above them, watching them from above as if she were in a plane, though much closer to the ground.

It was when she turned on Main Street that she saw the paper girl. She had dark brown skin and even darker hair pulled back into two pigtails. Above the noise of cars and chattering people, she cried out about the latest issue.

“Not even Batman could stop this!”

Slowly, Alice floated forward.

For a moment, the two women, the two Alices, looked at each other. One was frozen forever in shades of grey, nearly impossible to see beneath a humongous headline that screamed louder than the young worker girl ever could.

Alice brought her hands to her eyes. Turning, she floated forward in no direction, eyes held shut and hands over her ears. How had the news gotten around so fast? What would people think when they read the story? And what would others think?

She had seen Billy the night before, his face pale and mouth hung open. She had seen Jervis and the bat. Alice had even seen herself, or what was left of her.

Was this how her mother would find out the news? By seeing her daughter's face splashed across her morning newspaper? The woman had always warned her to be careful, for Alice to take her self-defense classes to heart, to do whatever she could to not be just another tragic girl lost. Another media sensation, known for a moment and then forgotten when the next big story rolled off the presses.

What about her boss? Ms. Cates had been a strict woman in the office, but she had always been there for Alice. May, Tanya, Alyssa, and all of her other friends? Would her old schoolmates see her and recognize her?

Even with her hands over her ears, nothing could block the noise from below.

“Excuse me, miss,” a deep voice spoke from below, “but I'd be interested in buying one of your papers.”


	3. Chapter 3

Even with the bandages on, Jervis couldn't help but rub at his nose. Billy had delivered a harder punch then Jervis thought that even the bat ever could.

His eyes locked on the tray below him, to the pile of grey mush that was supposed to be tuna fish casserole and limp, lumpy green beans. A plastic spork was set to the side, along with a carton of milk and a package of chocolate pudding.

Look on the bright side, he thought as he slowly grabbed the spork with a shaking hand, it's better then when they watched you eat breakfast earlier.

The doctors were nothing short of hungry eyed vultures. Whether they were simply watching him or pulling his flesh apart, ripping open his mouth in order to get answers to the questions they never stopped asking, they were always looming over him waiting for their moment to strike.

His room was a metallic grey, and his reflection shone vaguely across the walls, a blur of blue and pale flesh. A single light, long and thin, hung over his cell, and a bit of light came in from the window near his door.

The first floor had been much nicer than the second floor. The nurses down there had smiled while he had gotten X-rayed and bandaged up. The patients down there were allowed privileges to wear their clothing if they earned the trusts of their doctors. Visitors came every Sunday afternoon to see them, or checked in for individual meetings on other days after previous scheduling. A few had even had smiles on their faces, and if not had at least some spark of light, of life, inside of their eyes no matter how thin.

Second floor was similar, at least from what he had heard, though that was mainly where patients rooms were. They were rooms with windows to the outside world, beds with actual blankets, and more than just a sink and toilet in one corner to count as furnishing.

Third floor was a little slice of hell. Patients like him sat around in metal rooms with only their thoughts to entertain themselves.

These were different patients from the ones that he had seen on the first floor. Their eyes were harder, frowns heavier, and usually were looking for an indefinite stay. They had not checked themselves in, nor had any of their family members. A few even had green or blue skin.

All he had ever heard about Arkham in the past had concerned the third floor. The whispers never concerned the first and seconds floors; it was hard to get a juicy story out of those floors. Perhaps, in another life, he would have been down there instead.

But, he realized, if the faces of the policemen that had visited him earlier said anything, then it was that he certainly didn't belonged anywhere else.

The green beans lumped together in his throat and it took him half of his milk carton to get it down.

-

She had never not quite existed, at least not like this. Her professors may not have called on her during class, looking right past her to call on the students both beside and behind her. She may have faded into a crowd while walking down a street. At the office she had hardly stuck out. But this, whatever the hell this was, this was different.

Watching her own funeral was the most voyeuristic thing that she had ever done. There were people everywhere, from her extended family (it was hard enough to believe that her mother and father were able to reconcile being in the same room together, let alone her rowdy cousins) to coworkers to police officers. Even Bruce Wayne, the man that she had only seen once before during his visit to the office, was there with what must have been a whole truckload of flowers with him.

The whole affair had only been set up in a matter of days, moving in a whirlwind. Whereas Alice's hours had been dragging on into eternity, her afterlife even slower than her earlier life, the people around her had moved with haste.

She stared down at the closed coffin. Beneath a pile of flowers lay a polished wood coffin, a deep brown color gleamed in the light. How had mother, or father for that matter, been able to afford that? It looked like it cost at least five thousand dollars, and that was a rather modest estimate.

Even at her own funeral it was as if she didn't exist. If anyone could see her, then surely it could be here, a place where everyone was thinking about her. If someone were to just widen their eyes as they looked above the coffin to the stained glass windows behind her, or were to have their face go pale...

She sighed. Ahead, the streams of visitors moved one after the other, more and more coming in at what seemed like every moment. Most faces were a blur, nowhere near recognizable. Had it been the papers that made them come? Could the grim words have brought them all? Morbid as it sounded, she could not help but smile at the thought. Someone would have to notice her then, even if they were a stranger who ended up looking scared out of their wits.

Anything was better than this.

-

Renee was used to seeing Jim looking grim, grey and washed out, but it was a completely new look on Harvey Bullock. Perhaps the building was having some sort of effect on him, digging beneath his skin. The moment that they had entered, his face had paled and he had stopped making any remark or reference to Batman.

She folded her hands over her lap and straightened her back. The pew seats were made of hard wood, rougher to the back than any of the police station's plastic chairs, but she doubted that she would be leaving any time soon.

The room was hushed, everyone inside completely silent as the two darkly dressed figures walked to the stage. Each step held their weight behind it yet made not a single sound. Renee's ears rung, searching for a noise of any kind.

Bruce Wayne was the first to step onto the stage and turn towards the audience. He held the microphone tightly in his clenched hands. Behind him lay the coffin, shut as tightly as it could be. “It was with great regret and despair that I learned of young Alice Pleasance's passing. I have always tried to stay connected with my employees, to actually know who they are. Yet other than a brief meeting at my Wayne Tech offices, I can hardly claim that I know of the young woman.”

The room seemed entranced, every ear and eye on the man ahead. Renee had heard a number of his speeches before, just about any Gotham City police officer no matter their rank was destined to hear one at some time or the other, she had never heard this tone of voice before. It was lower and slower than she had heard, with a number of more pauses between his sentences.

“This is why I have asked Marcia Cates, a loyal worker of mine who knew Ms. Pleasance far more than I ever had, to lead this speech for me.” He gestured towards a red-haired woman standing beside him. “What happened was truly a tragedy, and the only thing that I can promise both to the Pleasance family and Gotham City itself is that both WayneTech and myself personally will do whatever I can to help ensure justice for the victim.” He took a few steps back and the woman took his place.

“To say that the night of November twenty-sixth was one of the strangest in my life is nothing short of true, and yet also the most tragic. There was nothing like suddenly coming to your senses and finding yourself dressed as a character from a child's story was nothing.” Perhaps, had someone else spoken, their voices would have gone a bit higher, turned the last words into a small joke to at least try and lighten the mood somewhat. But the sound of Marcia's voice, combined with the hard look in her eyes and ever deepening voice, only made Renee's heart fall into her chest. “Unlike Alice Pleasance, I was lucky enough to at least have escaped this predicament.”

Renee bit her lip. She had been on the force for years, never having left once and barely taken a vacation. When Batman had first flown into Gotham City, she had been there alongside Godon, Bullock, and the rest of the shocked and cautious police force. Promotions had caused her to climb up the force's ladder from a traffic cop to someone that Commissioner Gordon always depended on. Through all those years she had seen just about everything, from arson to grand theft to people running around and terrorizing the public in costumes.

All that and she had never seen anything like this. For the knife the man had on him, it had gone through more than just her throat. Her whole head had come off, and the whole force, even the forensics team who had to close off the area and then investigate it, had all looked at it as if their eyes were magnetically attracted to the scene. She had helped to lead the victim's fiancee out of the area, had seen the Hatter driven off to Arkham, and yet she had seen nothing quite like the body.

When she had been a child, she had read the nonsensical book that the Tetch fellow had been so obsessed with. Half of it had been gibberish to her young mind, the other sending her mind to places that she could never have possibly imagined herself. Talking cats, tea parties that lasted forever, and walking and talking cards had all seemed nothing short of impossible and yet the small child had yearned for a place like that. If she could have found her own rabbit hole...

Well, if she had then she hoped that it would not have ended up leading her to sights such as the one from a few nights before.

“Everything was a haze when I was first came back to my senses and really began to understand what was going on. Part of me couldn't believe that it was happening, and it was the news that I heard that really snapped the puzzle pieces together in my mind.” She paused and rubbed at her forehead. “A police officer came up to me and told me what had happened, explained that I and a number of citizens had been kidnapped by a worker of mine, Jer-” She stopped speaking mid-sentence and her face twisted into a heavy scowl. “They explained what happened and broke the news that another worker of mine, a secretary of mine named Alice Pleasance, had been murdered.”

“Slaughtered” was a better term. With all her years of facing homicide cases, of witnessing crime scene victims, and faced criminals whose actions and methods of disposal had made them look like saints compared to Tetch. He had cut through her quickly, with a force that had seemed impossible for a thin, weak little man such as himself, and done it so quickly that she had to wonder if he had thought of it before and simply had finally committed the deed.

“To say I was shocked is an understatement. Nothing made sense, and it felt as though my whole world had been turned upside down. Only the day before the young woman had been with me in the employee's lounge crying over her sudden breakup with her fiancee, and the day before that smiling and waving at me when I entered the office because she had come in early that morning.” She paused. “What happened to her was nothing short of horrific, and it was an especially terrible fate for such a polite girl as herself. We were never what I would call close friends, but we knew each other well. Alice was studying in the late afternoons and at night, using the secretary job to pay for her classes at Gotham University's medical school. She told me that she had always wanted to be a pediatrician and had studied hard through her first four years of college and was glad with each passing day that she was one day closer to reaching her goals.”

It was then that Renee thought that she saw Marcia's egg-like facade crack, a single tear escaping her eyes, but her hand was to her eye so quickly that for a moment all she could see was a blur. “I still can hardly believe it, though I doubt that anyone can. Things such as this aren't supposed to happen, or at least that's what we tell ourselves.” She sighed. “It certainly took me by surprise. Looking back, I can see signs of a former worker's behavior towards her, signs that if I had noticed earlier perhaps could have helped prevent this tragedy. Yet to hold onto the past can be dangerous, and for all my reminiscences I know that nothing can change the fact that this tragedy occurred.”

She stepped away from the podium and both she and Bruce Wayne exited the stage.

The silence from before vanished first with a single clap and then was followed by a crescendo of hands, yet the noise barely reached Montoya's ears.

-

“You haven't joined us for a drink in a while,” Nickie commented. Her platinum blond hair was pulled back into a long ponytail, her GCPD uniform replaced with a light purple blouse and knee-length velvety black pants.

Renee shrugged. “I haven't been feeling like I needed anything for a while.”

The bar was mostly silent that night. It was one of the least rowdy ones in Gotham, only two blocks from the police station, and yet the walk over had seemed to take hours.

“You and Gordon were gone most of the day,” Melanie, a tall black woman and head of the forensic toxicology team, commented. “Were you at the funeral?”

Renee nodded. Everything around her was a blur and she hadn't even had a drink yet. Everything had been since a few nights before, since she arrived at the crime scene with Bullock. Like Marcia Cates, she supposed that her world had flipped over. The lights all blurred together and she could hardly read the names printed on the bottles' labels behind the bar. The bar stool felt harder than before and dug into her skin.

“Someone from my team went for about an hour and a half,” Melanie commented. “She ended up calling afterwards and said that she didn't think that she'd be able to make it back for the rest of the day. The case wasn't even anything that our department had to help investigate.”

“How could she not have heard about it?” Charlotte, one of the leaders of the traffic force, asked. “It's all over the news. The media's all saying that the Batman failed everyone, could have done something to stop it. The tabloids have already started releasing a bunch of bogus articles as well.”

“Can I get you anything, officer?” the bartender asked. He was short and plump, with thinning dark hair that was slightly balding. For a moment, Renee only stared at him before it finally hit her just who he was talking to.

“I'll just take a few shots,” she said. “Nothing too hard and don't bring too many.” She tried to return his smile, but she doubted that she did anything more but show him her teeth.

“Of course,” he said, and his smile widened all the same. “And for you ladies?”

Renee's shoulders relaxed, and she slouched down, her elbows against the table. For a moment, all eyes were finally off of her.

What, she wondered, had possessed Gordon into becoming convinced that she should be the leader of this case? She hadn't been one of the first officers to respond, and for the homicide investigation cases that she had led before none had been like this.

“We've missed you coming over with us after work,” Nickie commented once the bartender had left.

“She might be trying to save her liver,” Charlotte responded.

The small group chuckled sans Renee, who merely stared down at the polished surface of the table below her.

“Has anything interesting happened to you lately?” Charlotte asked. She paused for a moment. “I mean personally, of course, in your own life.”

She shook her head. “No.”

“Are you still seeing that Kate girl that you always talked so highly about?” Nickie broke in.

Renee sighed and again shook her head. This really wasn't how she had expected the night to go, and she doubted that it would get any better.

The bartender came back with the drinks. The shots ranged in color from clear as water, though the liquid was thicker, to dark brown. When her eyes met the small glasses, bile rose in her throat.

Pulling out her wallet, she placed a twenty down. “This should cover everything and still leave you with some change.” She placed another five down. “Whatever is left once the drinks are paid for is yours.” She turned to face the others. “Enjoy everything for me. It's about time that I got going.”


	4. Chapter 4

All those times where Alice had watched horror movies, whether she was at a high school sleepover with her friends or because Billy had just found what he thought was the most perfect video to rent, she had always closed her eyes at the scary parts. Considering those tended to be most of the movie, she usually hadn't had much to remember them by, especially when she ended up keeping her eyes closed so much that she'd fall asleep. Whether it was werewolves, knife-wielding slashers, or zombies, her eyes always ended up staying closed. Yet there had been one movie, only one, where she had kept her eyes open and locked on the screen the entire movie.

It hadn't been particularly scary now that she looked back at it, and her younger self had probably thought the same thing. It had just been one of a handful of old VCR tapes that her friends had brought to a birthday movie night. They could have watched a romantic comedy or drama film, even a cheesy sci-fi film, but somehow her friends had decided on the horror movie. And while it played, she watched every moment from beginning to end and didn't even get up to pop another bag of popcorn like her friend Ann had.

The film had starred a young girl dealing with the ghost of another. In a way, it had been a depressing film, and there was a point near the middle where she had almost been crying. Had the murder scene not come and blood filled the screen then she just might have shed a tear. Even then, where she would have shut her eyes had this been any other movie, she kept them open and on the old TV's screen.

Looking back, it had been quite a waste of two hours. Not only had the special effects been nothing short of terrible, but the facts on ghosts were wrong.

Ghost, she thought. The word was so strange but there was no other way to describe it. A phantom was a haunting figure and she could hardly be one if no one ever noticed her. Surely the term “poltergeist” would never apply, at least so long as any noise she made went unheard.

Ghost, she thought again. Ghost, ghost, ghost.

The word echoed through her head as she slowly floated into Billy's apartment. His boxes, which he had begun to pack ever since they had decided to move in together following their engagement, were still packed though they looked untouched. Every day she had entered, seen the same scene again and again. He was always there, usually crying and if not at least looking grim faced, if he was even in at all. Looking at him, it was like she was seeing a whole different person who just happened to have a matching face and voice.

Floating through the small apartment, she saw no one. A few empty dishes were stacked in the sink, a book folded down on its spine to mark the page was left forgotten on the coffee table, and a small layer of dust invisible to none but the keen eyed covered everything. It had lost the presence of being lived in, as if he had simply left one day and never returned.

But he'll be back, she reminded herself. The lights were still on after all and the food in the fridge, at least what she saw when she stuck what was left of her head into it, all looked fresh and newly bought.

He'll be back, she repeated. He always comes back.

He had come back before, when she was sure that nothing would ever be the same again. Even after he had broken their engagement he had come back to her, proposed all over again. It had been even better than before, and he had brought flowers with him and even gotten a brand new ring with an even bigger diamond than the first.

If he could come back after that then surely he could again. And maybe today would be different, the day that he finally noticed that she was there. If they could just connect again then perhaps things would be better.

Alice thought back to the movie, to the stories that she had heard as a child. Ghosts in those stories always needed closure to move on. If there were ghosts then surely there were also places beyond here, better places. Maybe those places weren't filled with clouds or singing angels, but surely they had to be better than wondering the earth, watching life move on without her. Almost anything had to be better than that.

Why, there were hundreds of thousands of possibilities! Perhaps there were places filled with nothing but doughnuts and chocolate, or lands full of animals. A whole place filled with puppies certainly seemed like a nice place to spend eternity.

She hugged at the air, as if there were a small Golden retriever like the one her parents had adopted when she was a child, when the door opened. Alice turned to the door and had to keep from closing her eyes.

Work had never been one of the high points of Billy's life, but it had never taken him quite like this. There were bags beneath his eyes and his hair was a mess, as if an entire windstorm had blown on it. His face looked to be the color of flour. The tie of his suit looked like it would fall off of him at any moment, and his jacket's sleeves were rolled up. His pants were disheveled and wrinklier than an elderly person.

“Bill-” The word wasn't even completely out of her mouth before he walked forward and right through her. He didn't so much as react, just continued towards his room before slamming the door behind him.

For a few moments, Alice simply blinked, the world in front of her spinning slightly. When the haze finally ended, she wrapped her arms around her chest and slowly floated out of the door as if it weren't even there at all.

There was always tomorrow.

-

“Remember,” Dr. Leland said, “recreation hour is a privilege here and quite a few of the other staff members would love to have it revoked from you, Jervis.”

Jervis gave her a shaky smile. “I understand.” His eyes turned towards the ground. As they walked, their footsteps echoed across the otherwise silent halls.

“I want to warn you of something.”

Jervis raised an eyebrow. “Is there something wrong?”

“A few of the patients might be a bit,” she began. She was silent a few moments longer. “Well, it is likely that they will be a bit curious.”

Curiouser and curiouser! Jervis thought.

“You do not need to feel obliged to ask anything that they ask or to confirm or deny any stories or rumors that they might have heard. Whenever a new patient comes, the others tend to question them more than any police officer or doctor ever did.” Her lips, once held in a straight line that rivaled even the greatest of poker faces, settled into a deep frown. “I won't tell you to not admit anything to them if you'd like. Certainly, I could hardly be able to stop you. But if you feel unsure, if the idea bothers you, then please do not tell anyone inside. If there's any pressure from the other patients then tell me or any other doctor or security officer that you can.”

Jervis nodded. “Why did you do this for me?”

She paused, turning to face him and stopping mid-step. “What do you mean?”

“You told me yourself earlier, most patients don't get this,” he paused once again, his eyes turning back towards the ground, “this privilege so early.”

“As you surely already know, I am your doctor. My job is to help ensure that you get the best treatment possible, and while you're here I doubt that staying alone will help you.” She turned to face him again, her dark brown eyes freezing his gaze. “Are you uncomfortable with this arrangement?”

He shook his head. “No, of course not. Thank you, doctor Leland.”

She nodded. “Alright, just remember what I mentioned about seeing me if the other patients are bothering you.”

“I understand.”

The recreation area was smaller than he had expected and had at most about fifteen people inside of it. All wore matching grey uniforms and had everything from face splitting smiles to frowns so heavy that they seemed to make the wearer's entire face sag.

For a moment, all eyes in the room were on him. Jervis felt his heart skip a beat. Even when a few faces turned away, he still stood frozen staring ahead, barely even to breathe.

“Looks like someone finally went bonkers enough to end up here,” a heavy voice said. “Considering what the doctors say he calls himself, it's hard to believe that he didn't do it any sooner.”

“Probably just got mercury poison,” another voice, slower than before, responded. “Isn't that what happens in his supposed job?”

“Not really a hatter,” another voice popped in. “Just pretends to be one.”

“Isn't everything a game of pretend?”

The voices all came so fast that he could barely tell who was speaking before another voice joined into the conversation.

Dr. Leland's words echoed in his head and he slowly turned away from everyone. The conversation stilled, though the few remaining eyes did not leave him as he walked towards a bookshelf in the corner.

There was everything from ex-library books with scribbled out markings to battered paperbacks with cracked spines that looked as though they would fall apart if he even lay a finger on them. He stared over them, searching the spines and scanning words yet never finding what he needed.

If he could just get a copy, either Alice's Adventures in Wonderland or Through the Looking Glass (both if he was lucky), then he would know what to do. No matter how many times Jervis read Carroll's, there was always something new hidden away in the words that only could be found when read again.

“Excuse me,” a voice said.

Jervis turned, looking up. Above him stood a tall man, over six feet tall and so thin that he could see the outline of his bones. Messy, uncombed orange-brown hair fell partially over his forehead and nearly hit the rim of his glasses. He held a book in one hand, the other held up and curled slightly with his nails out.

Jervis quickly moved.

Wordlessly, the man leaned forward and deposited the book back on the shelf before picking another up just as quickly. He turned away, yet only after he had moved two or three steps his head turned back. “If you're looking for what I think you are, then you aren't going to find it here. The staff probably believe that the books would have an adverse effect on the patients.”

Jervis nodded.

I suppose it only makes sense, Jervis thought. We're all mad here.

He turned back to the bookshelf. Striking up conversations had never been his strong point, and if Dr. Leland's hypothesis was correct then they would not ask him anything but why he was at Arkham. Carroll's work or not, a book was always welcoming.

-

He blinked, once, twice, a third time, and then so many times that he could barely tell when his eyes were open and when they were shut. All the while, the glowing figure floating on the opposite side of his room did not vanish.

“Alice?”

“Jervis.” It was most certainly her voice. She had only spoken this low before once, when she had arrived at work especially tired and irritable after already having been forced to stay in and do overtime the previous night.

He opened his mouth and then just as quickly closed it.

Arkham, he had learned, was rather predictable. There was never a chance to do six impossible things before breakfast.

He shook his head and held his hands over his eyes. No, no, no! This wasn't happening. Alice was, Alice was-

Dr. Leland had explained it earlier that day when she was seeing him. “I know we have not discussed in depth what brought you here, even when you have been here for over a week, but I really do at least need to explain one thing.”

Her words had been a knife to the gut, and not even a fresh wound at that, but another strike meant only to inflict more pain. Jervis knew, he had always known! The queen had demanded the trial and had called him to the witness stand. A jury full of animals had watched him with their beady little eyes as he spoke. And when the sentence came, when her majesty's words were expressed...

Well, who was he to deny his queen's orders?

When he finally looked up, she was closer than ever before. Though he could see the collar of her dress and her head, there was no neck holding them together. Her lips were set into a heavy frown and her eyes were nearly impossible to read, the irises and pupils having blended together.

“I know what you're thinking.” For a moment her voice softened, and she looked away from him to her arms which were clasped together around her waist. She was still wearing the costume from earlier, the apron neat and her skirt wrinkle free, though her headband was gone. “This is impossible.”

“'Only if you believe it is.'”

She looked up suddenly, an eyebrow raised.

He let out a chuckle. Oh, how could he try and deny it? He had witnessed far stranger things before; ghosts were certainly more believable than flying bread and talking animals and yet he had seen those as well.

“Oh, Alice, 'you're not the same as you were before. You were much more...'” He paused, rubbing at his forehead. “'muchier. You've lost your muchness.'” He put his hands to his face, blocking the light from reaching his eyes. Oh, how could he have not known that something like this was going to happen? The only way to live with the unexpected was to know that they were going to happen after all.

Perhaps he should have expected her sooner! Oh, but how could he be surprised? His clock was two days slow!

-

If this were a movie then Alice's eyes would have been closed tight and her hands held to her ears. Arkham certainly showed its age, even with its shiny, sterile floors in the medical ward that probably had the same bleach-scent that all hospitals had. Its security systems may have been advanced, but it could do nothing to hide the stone walls or the ancient wood that somehow held the building together. The metal sign alone, the one that she had seen when she had first arrived, had looked like it had stood for an eternity.

Yet, despite what was happening in front of her, she couldn't help but look forward.

Perhaps he was laughing or perhaps he was crying. Either way, Jervis was acting as mad as his namesake, and with his face covered and body curled up onto his body, it was impossible to try and read him.

He pulled his hands away, his face paler than before and tears slowly streaming down them. He rubbed at them, his lips turned into a frown.

It was then that there was a knock at the door before they were wrenched open. A tall black woman, dressed in a wrinkle-free white lab coat and holding a clipboard tightly in her hands, stood by the door next to a stout security guard dressed in blue.

“Jervis, what's going on? We could hear you from across the hall. Did something happen?”

He gestured towards her, and Alice instinctively tightened into herself even when the the gazes of both the doctor and security guard looked right through her.

“'Oh dear,'” he said with a sigh. “'I do wish I hadn't cried so much.'” He chuckled and looked past the other two, meeting Alice dead in the eyes. “'Oh, come on now. Crying won't help.'”

-

Renee sighed, clutching her notebook tighter. If she could just get this trip done quickly then she could get back to the station and work on something else. Knowing the city of Gotham, there would never be just one case that she would need to work on.

When she had first walked inside of Arkham, she had been a new officer who had only been in for less than a year. It had seemed intimidating, the building a little too tall (even when it was nothing compared to Gotham's many skyscrapers), the lighting a little too low, and the walls just a little too close together.

The nurses at the front desk did not give her so much as a second glance when she arrived, though one, an older woman, smiled to her. She gave a weak smile back before walking to the elevators. It came quickly, the doors opening with a slight metallic creak. Stepping inside, she pressed the button to the third floor with a shaking finger.

Whenever she passed by the prisoner's rooms, she had to wonder just what they were thinking when they looked at her. She may have not been Gordon but she wasn't a regular cop either. Chances were, she had probably directly caught them at least once. Considering Arkham's unspoken revolving door policy she would probably end up doing it again.

She turned the hallway and, despite herself, smiled. Some days she had to walk through what felt like the entire place to find whom she was looking for.

“Joan,” she spoke.

The woman turned and smiled. “You're here early, Renee.”

“I got busy with something back at the station, but I still managed to finish and come back here early.” She held up her notebook and police folder. “I do believe you know what I'm here to discuss with you.”

“I'll see you in the meeting room soon,” she responded. “Right now I still have to finish something with one of my patients before I can speak with you.”

Renee nodded. “Please, take your time.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I should have more of the story, if not the end, posted soon.


End file.
